5 Ways to Foster an Employee Centric Culture

Let’s define an Employee Centric Culture. It’s an organization that does the following
- Puts their employees first
- Creates open communication and encourages feedback
- Creates an environment that is safe and motivating
- Creates a healthy workplace environment
When organizations take this approach they create a workplace that is Happy & Engaging.
So why does happiness and engagement even matter? Does it really do anything besides creating positivity? Yes it does– you can expect the following results:
- Increased employee retention
- Increased productivity
- Increased customer satisfaction
- Increased sales
It’s a no-brainer to want to foster an Employee Centric Culture, but how do you do it?
Here are five easy tips:
- Gather Employee Feedback and Act on It
- Improve Your Total Rewards
- Create Growth Opportunities
- Focus on Well-being
- Create Trust
Gather Employee Feedback and Act on It
Listen to your employees and work with them to improve the workplace. This can be done in a formal sense of conducting employee engagement surveys, stay interviews or exit interviews. You can also spend more time asking your employees how the company can improve the workplace. Make sure to act on the information or else trust will be lost.
Improve Your Total Rewards
Be sure to have a total rewards strategy that meets the needs of your employees. Measure our employees’ needs – work life balance, education, pay, bonuses, etc. Create a strategy and work with your employees to empower them to understand their worth. It is important to compare your offer with the industry benchmarks or those offered by competitors to ensure fairness.
Create Growth Opportunities
You want to hire employees that want to grow, improve, and make a real difference. In order to retain them you will need to create those opportunities. This is why Performance Development Plans should be created. These plans should encourage training, peer mentoring, and feedback.
Focus on Well-Being
Employee wellness comes in many different forms – physical, mental, emotional, and financial. You need to look after your employees and take care of them. The importance of health and safety, wellness plans, and a healthy workplace culture cannot be overstated. You should even teach your employees about conflict management, personality profiling, emotional intelligence, rules of engagement, and your core values. The best way to reinforce these values and rules is to lead by example.
Create Trust
Trust is everything and without it an Employee Centric Culture is not possible. Trust can be difficult to build and easy to lose. Depending on the level of trust you have in your workplace, this may take time to improve. The best way to improve trust is to simply listen to your employees, take their concerns into account, and make real changes in the workplace. This could be something as small as casual Fridays or as big as an overhaul of your compensation programs. Transparency is key here–how can you expect employees to be open and honest with you if you are not open and honest with them?
Creating an Employee Centric Culture is essential for success. Often organizations that are not employee centric struggle to survive with high turnover, lower productivity, and lower customer satisfaction. Organizations that are growing and successful are almost always very employee centric. Take care of your employees and they will take care of you.
Reach out to us if you want to have a chat to see how we can help you create a more Employee Centric Culture.
Contact Chad at: chad@peoplestuffnl.ca or (709) 697-2423.